Various computer security protocols have been developed to ensure secure communications between computers. In one configuration, two or more computers may communicate with each other using the SSH protocol, where a computer possesses the public key of another computer for encrypted communication with the other computer. For example, the DS6000™ Storage Controller, commercially available from International Business Machines Corporation, New Orchard Road, Armonk, N.Y., 10504, U.S.A., is built from two separate computing devices that sit in the same physical chassis and have access to a shared hardware memory area. The computers communicate with each other using SSH, where each computer possesses the other device's public key, allowing the computers to communicate without need for a password.
Adding or replacing one computer in a group of computers using password-less SSH requires that the new computer somehow acquire its own copies of the other computers' public keys. However, a public key cannot be passed to the new computer using password-less SSH because secure password-less SSH usage requires that the new computer already have the key. It is also not practical to preconfigure the new computer with necessary key information, as such computer additions or replacements often occur at different installation sites, each having different keys, and are often meant to be carried out by technicians on an off-the-shelf, plug-and-play basis.